Commissioned by Cheshire West and Cheshire council a series of public art exterior sculptures were created for the redevelopment of Winsford Town Park.

The town and its council were passionate about the considerations in respect of the towns defining industrial past and heritage so naturally this became a starting point for the project.

The town of Winsford has an incredibly defining industrial past and with that the scope to use stories, memories and history from this is immense.

Seven Sisters is a series of 8 sculptures that relate both directly with the local chimneys of Winsford and the scientific characteristics of salt. Over a century ago the small town was dominated by chimneys and smoke and famous for the processing of salt. Unfortunately as time has passed the chimneys have now disappeared as the industry has retreated underground once again.  The salt industry is still intact (in fact over half the salt spread around Britains roads is still produced in the small town) but the chimneys have all gone.

Named Seven Sisters for a number of reasons including the immense influence the historical impact of the industry had on the town. Designed to reflect multiple chimneys which dominated Winsford skyline in 1800’s to 1900’s the influence of this is certainly evident. In particular the project was influenced by a historical fact that was discovered- Hamlett Salt Works featured a series of chimneys nicknamed the Seven Sisters and the sculptures have been designed to honour the impact the salt industry had on the town.

The network of octahedrons were an inspiration for the exterior public art installation. Looking at the molecular structure of salt (sodium chloride) it was discovered that if certain points of sodium or chloride were joined it always created a lattice network of octahedrons.

From the network of octahedrons the chimney structures were formed. They were then deconstructured to recreate the negative spaces that had been eroded from the town due to the salt industry. It was extremely important to have a connection of these 2 points.

The core principle when the construction of the pieces took place was to keep the inner structure complete when looking at them from 2 sides. It was vital to enchant the visitors to walk around individual pieces of the overall public art sculptural project and to emphasize their appearance as being organic. This also ensured that the symbolic nature of the organic growth that is evident in this thriving town was represented.

The inclusion of past, present and future influences was important as well as the pieces needing to have a natural quality element. As well as these qualities a feeling of movement with a strong yet translucent nature was also essential and therefore included.

The outline network of octahedrons were drawn and then captured in 2D. It was important to emulate this within the sculptures so this was achieved by using steel rods as the main material and also the inclusion of a bright white finish.

Family and the feeling of family is also extremely important to the residents of Winsford and therefore it was important to implement this into the methodology of the sculptures. Taking this into account the sculptures methodology is the same but each one is at various sizes and densities. Essentially representing all families and there many forms. The result is 3 size variations with 8 totally unique outcomes.